


Preventative Care

by ObsidianMichi



Series: Solas and Eirwen Shorts [1]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 21:22:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4035034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObsidianMichi/pseuds/ObsidianMichi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the Hinterlands, Solas tends Eirwen Lavellan's wounded leg while she mercilessly flirts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Preventative Care

“Are you saying I’m not distracting?”

Solas didn’t glance up. Mouth pulling into a thin line, fighting a smile, he continued to wrap her foot with a clean set of bandages. “I did not imply a lack of interest,” he said. “Merely that my concentration cannot be so easily swayed.”

Eirwen Lavellan leaned back on the tree stump, her fingernails dug into the bark. He could hear delicate teeth chewing on a lower lip and did not need to look up to know her eyebrow rose wryly. “Ah-huh.”

For a moment, there was silence. Only the song of birds in overhead branches, a gentle flutter of wings. He heard heavy footsteps tromping through the underbrush to their left. The usual sound of Inquisition soldiers. Humans and their lack of delicacy. _Shemlen_ as the Dalish would say. Unaware, perhaps, that they too were the same as those the despised. Shemlen, a word Eirwen Lavellan exorcised from her vocabulary. He’d heard her speak the slur perhaps once or twice and then, as time went on, not at all.

Adaptation. A surprising turn for one from a culture so rigid and inflexible.

With careful fingers, he lifted her heel. The offending boot fallen to the side, tipped and fallen on the grass. Red toes wiggled in the sun, a sign she was not badly damaged from her fall. Still blue bruises peeked out of the bandages around her instep. Running his fingers down the top of her foot, pads searching for signs of injury and any fractured bones.

She winced.

“You know, Solas,” the wheedling tone was back. “There’s no reason to do this here.”

He gently prodded the region below her ankle again.

Again, she winced. Leg twitched, almost jerked to escape a rush of pain.

“How do you propose to reach camp?” he asked. “Wounded as you are?”

“I could hobble,” Eirwen replied. Only a slight hitch in her cheerful enthusiasm voiced the agony racing through her body. “No?” She leaned forward. “How about hop? I promise I’ll do it slowly. From one tree to another, move bush to bush. You could watch.”

He frowned.

“I didn’t think so.” He watched her head tilt, sky blue eyes rolling sideways and flicking toward camp. “We could call Cassandra back,” Eirwen continued. “If I ask nicely, maybe she’ll put aside her sword and carry me. I mean, I’m not that heavy.” Corners of her mouth twitching as her nails scraped the bark. “She could do it.”

“That is unnecessary,” he replied. “You are not severely injured and thus require no immediate medical attention.”

“What do you call this then?”

“Preventative care,” Solas replied. “Though you may desperately require it, you are not in any danger.”

“We could solve this with a potion. Just one elfroot, easily refilled twenty feet that way,” her arm pointed left toward camp. “Then, get back to the mission. These rifts won’t close themselves.”

Shaking his head, Solas let his gaze drop back to the business at hand. _I could use the rest,_ he thought. They all could. Fingertips running down her calf, his nose wrinkled. Watching Eirwen Lavellan send herself shooting off a cliff with yet another a poorly aimed Fade Step might be one more than his heart could bear. “Rest and time are what you need,” he said. Finishing with the wrap, he straightened and rested both hands on the stump. “An elixir will not remind you of the gravity of your mistakes.”

“Or, perhaps, just gravity?” When he didn’t respond, she laughed. “I swear, Solas,” Eirwen murmured. Her bright eyes locked on his and she leaned forward until their noses almost brushed. “It’s almost as if you don’t approve of spectacular flights off cliffs.”

He lifted a careful hand, tracing her cheek with a thumb. Her skin burned under his touch, warm and bright. “I would prefer you be more careful, yes.”

A grin tugged her mouth. “This is just because you don’t know any healing spells, isn’t it?”

Solas snorted. “Three days of rest will aid everyone.”

She laughed. Her fingers swept up the back his head, gentle and careful. Hesitant, almost unsure. A warm palm on his cool skin, she drew him down and rested her forehead against his. Their noses brushed.

Companionship, he realized, friendship. His brief flirtations at Haven were warmly received, his advice taken to heart, his stories appreciated, yet this, it meant something more. Acceptance, a gesture she might make to another of the Dalish in thanks. In doing so, she offered such closeness to him. Kinship. In her mind, they were blood kin. There were, he knew, a thousand ways one might say ‘ar lath ma’ and a thousand meanings came with their own interpretation. He did not know what he expected, this however was not it.

“Ma serannas,” Solas murmured. Then, he said, very slowly, “Lethallan.”

Wrinkling her nose, Eirwen rubbed hers against his, tip to tip. “I should say that to you, Lethallin.”

“Did you not already?”

Her lips yanked sideways, pursing and, once again, her eyebrow rose. Then, she rolled her eyes. Exhaling a long stream of air, Eirwen blew orange bangs off her brow. Her gaze flicked back to him and she smiled rather slyly. “Maybe I did.” She popped a little closer and, lifting her chin, she kissed his nose.

He blinked, then he chuckled. “You are attempting to coerce me, da’len.”

“It’s true, hahren,” she said, batting her lashes. “I’m injured. I should be carried. Give me a ride?”

 _Void take me,_ Solas thought. Taking her cheek between his thumb and forefinger, he pinched. “Indeed?” he asked. “And what have you done that is so deserving of a reward? Perhaps, instead, I should put you over my shoulder and carry you off to bed.”

“No!” Eirwen giggled. “I’d fight you.”

“Am I to be frightened of a silly child?” he asked. “One barely able to stand? No.” He shook his head. “I do not believe so.”

“I can stand,” Eirwen replied. “I’ll wrap a barrier around my foot, then I’ll set fire to your pack.”

“Here,” he said. Taking her hands, he pulled her to her feet, then he wrapped one arm over his shoulder as he cinched his other around her waist. “You may lean on me.”

Grumbling, she rested her head on his shoulder. Her breath raced across his neck. “I suppose I’ll accept the privilege.”

“As you should.”

Carefully, they began to make their way toward the camp.

“You know, I have a staff? I could be leaning on that!”

“Should you balance long enough, you are welcome to attempt it.”

“Is that a challenge, hahren?”

“It is not, da’len.”

“It definitely sounds like one.”

He sighed. “If you wish.”

“It’s tempting,” her arm pulled tighter across his shoulders, “but,” her eyes dropped and she tried to take another slight hobbling step forward, “This is fine.”

“Certainly,” Solas said. Focusing on keeping his support around her waist, eyes following each small shift in her eyes, he ignored the warmth fizzling in his stomach. “For now.”

“For now?” Eirwen glanced at him. “Really?” She took another hopping step. Fingers tightening on his hand, she winced. “Expecting to be traded in for someone more willing to carry me, Solas?”

“No,” he replied. “Merely that you will eventually need to make your own way.”

Her laughter caught him off guard. “I suppose,” she giggled. “Everyone always must, you know.”

He let his eyes slide sideways. _I know._ She was not looking at him, her eyes on the ground instead. Watching each stone as if it were some enemy attempting to capture her, to make her trip and fall. _As if I'd allow it._ The amount of feeling, the level of warmth which came with that thought was surprising. Yet, he realized, it was also welcome. He saw the grin still played on her mouth, warm eyes pausing ever so often to glance at him. Her arms held onto him, naturally and easily as each inhalation. Easy as breathing. Here, he was not a man caught out of time. He was neither lost nor foundering. He had a place and a reason for being. He belonged.

In a sunlit grove, as he listened to Eirwen Lavellan laugh and guided her careful steps, Solas felt for the first time since he’d awoken from In Uthenera. He was no longer alone.

**Author's Note:**

> The part where Solas has no access to healing spells is never going to get old.


End file.
